


THE HARD MORNING AFTER

by Mikkeneko



Series: A SPIRIT OUT OF FADE [3]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Crack, Drunken Shenanigans, Drunkenness, Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-04
Updated: 2015-06-04
Packaged: 2018-04-02 18:53:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4070812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mikkeneko/pseuds/Mikkeneko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anders hasn't touched alcohol since he became one with Justice. This morning, he's reminded why.</p>
            </blockquote>





	THE HARD MORNING AFTER

**Author's Note:**

> This is more or less part of the A SPIRIT OUT OF FADE series, but it was really too long to fit into the drabble format so it gets its own entry.

There were days like this when Anders hated the sun, the burning, piercing, eye-stabbing bringer of mornings that man was never meant to experience. Even Hawke's heavy velvet curtains couldn't block out the hateful light, and Anders groaned as even the slightest attempt to shift out of its path turned into an arcing bolt of pain through his head.

"Ohhhh Maker," Anders moaned, flopping one hand over his face to try to block out the light. Even his own hand was too heavy, too hot to bear the touch of it on his skin. "Whatever I did to deserve this headache, I repent for it."

"Anders! You're awake," a familiar voice said from nearby, and the world dipped and lurched as the other man sat up in the bed. There was a clink of glassware nearby, and then a cool glass was pressed against Anders' lips. "Here, drink this, you don't look at all well."

"I don't feel at all well," Anders mumbled, drinking the cool liquid gratefully. Water, spiked with embrium and elfroot, thank Andraste. The astringent taste cleared his head enough that he was able to take the empty glass, struggle upright and put it on the bedside table. "What happened? The last thing I remember was going to root out that cabal of blood mages on the Wounded Coast. I saw – I thought I saw…" Coruscating lights, the sharp smell of ozone, and a sound that had no earthly equivalent – but that every mage knew. "Did the Veil tear?"

"Yes, it very much did tear. We were up to our asses in demons," Hawke said, sounding relentlessly cheerful about it. "At least they had the courtesy to eat the maleficars first but I tell you, for a while there I was pretty scared. And, apparently, so were you, because we had an unexpected addition to the party."

"Oh, no." Anders' stomach did a slow roll of dread. "Did Justice…?"

"Made an appearance, yes, and cleaned up handily," Hawke grinned. "Don't worry, he was the perfect gentleman. Had no trouble discerning friend from foe, or even  _Carver_ from foe."

"But then what happened after the fight?" Anders put a hand to his head. He'd been in trouble, but he didn't remember taking a hit to the head. "I don't remember…"

"Well," Hawke drawled out the word. "The fighting was finished and Justice was still there. Showed no signs of you reappearing. So Varric invited him down to the Hanged Man with us to celebrate."

Anders' eyes widened. "And here I thought Varric was the  _sensible_ one."

"You know Varric, can't resist the possibility of something interesting to put in his next book." Hawke shrugged. "Honestly I think he just wanted to ask him a few questions, you know, about the Fade and other spirit-y things. It was  _Isabela's_  idea to try Justice out on Corff's whiskey."

"She did  _what?"_  Anders did a double-take.

"I think she thought it would be funny," Hawke offered

Anders stared at his lover. "And you didn't stop her?!"

Hawke at least had the grace to look shamefaced, although he didn't quite make it all the way to sincere. "Well…"

"I see. You  _also_ thought it would be funny," Anders said dryly. "And?"

"Well, at first Justice refused. Said there was no point, that 'mortal poisons' didn't work on him."

"They don't." Anders shook his head. "Or, well, they didn't. Oghren managed to badger him into drinking with us a few times back at Vigil's Keep, but it didn't do anything for him." Which was to be expected, really, since Kristoff's body had been  _dead,_  so there was nothing for the alcohol to work on.

 _Anders'_  body, on the other hand…

"Isabela kept after him to try, and eventually he gave in," Hawke continued. "So he went for a few rounds of whiskey with us…"

"Oh, Maker…" Anders moaned.

"And nothing really happened," Hawke said, putting his hands up peaceably. "Isabela tried to get dirty details about our sex life out of him, but he wasn't interested in talking about it. Mostly he just sat and drank and talked forcefully about injustice, the evils of Templars and slavers and darkspawn and so on."

"…So no real change, then."

"Isabela was pretty disappointed," Hawke said. "By the time she gave up and went up to her room, Justice had drunk an awful lot. We didn't realize until he stood up and tried to walk in a straight line that it _had_  affected him after all."

"Oh Maker!" Anders winced.

"It was pretty funny!" Hawke grinned, showing his as always _incredibly inappropriate_ sense of humor. "Except the problem with getting a Fade warrior spirit too drunk to walk in a straight line, as it turns out, is that when said spirit meets walls, the wall loses."

"Oh, Maker." Anders buried his head in his hands.

"So we _may_  owe the Hanged Man a new door," Hawke concluded.

Anders spoke around his hands, voice muffled. "Please tell me that was all and that you brought him back here to sleep it off."

"Well… I tried," Hawke defended himself. "Have you ever tried to tell a drunken Fade spirit what to do? I'm pretty proud of myself for getting him pointed up in the direction of Hightown at all. He kept stopping to give lectures about injustice to trees."

"In broad daylight?!" Anders demanded. "Didn't anybody see him?"

"Oh yes, people saw him," Hawke said. "In fact, one of the Wild Roses tried to proposition him."

"She must have been desperate," Anders said glumly. The Wild Roses – semi-polite Kirkwall slang for any prostitutes not based out of the Blooming Rose – had never propositioned  _him._

Hawke leered. "Oh, she was  _desperate_ all right."

Anders decided not to think too hard about that. "But I mean… the guards? Didn't anybody wonder why he – why I was glowing?"

"Don't worry about it," Hawke reassured him. "I told them we'd just been clearing bioluminescent jellyfish out of the tunnels under the docks and hadn't had a chance to wash up yet."

"And they  _believed_ you?"

Hawke chuckled. "This is Kirkwall, love."

Garrett, Anders thought, had a point. The city was such a hotspot for weird happenings of all kind, both natural and (more often) unnatural, that there was very little its citizens weren't prepared (or resigned) to accept. "So you got him home without any other trouble, right?"

"Well… mostly." Hawke was hedging. "Remember that big bronze statue of Knight-Commander Meredith that used to be up in the Hightown market square?"

Anders scowled. "Of course I know that ugly –" He broke off. "Wait a minute, what do you mean  _'used to be'_  ?"

"Well, Justice got into a bit of an argument with it."

"Oh, Maker." Anders muttered.

"It was… something," Hawke agreed, sounding admiring. "I couldn't stop him."

"Did you actually try?"

"Well – no."

Anders sighed. Hawke continued. "Anyway, after headbutting ten tons of bronze into submission –"

"Somehow this is the only part of this story that is not surprising  _at all."_ Anders interrupted, raising a hand to feel across his wincing forehead.

"– he ended up being – how else? –  _violently_ ill over the, ah, remains." Hawke smirked, apparently finding the desecration of the city's premier military authority far more amusing than Anders did.

"Oh,  _Maker."_  This time it was a prayer.

Hawke tsked in disapproval. "I swear, Anders, he didn't even have _that_  much whiskey. You're kind of a lightweight, did you know?"

"I haven't touched a drop of alcohol for three years," Anders snapped back waspishly. "Thank you for the vivid demonstration of  _why that is."_

Hawke shrugged apology, or at least agreement. "So anyway I had to help him the rest of the way back to the house. By this point he was getting pretty weepy –"

"Justice?  _Weepy?_  Are we talking about the same spirit?"

"Oh yeah, he was going on and on about the unappreciated beauty of the material world," Hawke said. "A few times I think he was trying to recite poetry, except none of the rhymes actually rhymed. It was kind of sweet, really. But!" he added hastily. "I got him home and put him to bed without any trouble after that!"

"…I see." Anders thought back to his first confused moments on waking. Hawke had already been there; not only that, but Hawke's tunic had been tangled in Anders' hands, in a grip that had not looked easy to escape from. Either Anders had woken up when Hawke came to bed later and didn't remember it, or… "And yourself to bed with him?"

"Well, he wouldn't let me leave." Hawke glanced away, looking slightly embarrassed. "It was like sharing a bed with an octopus. _Of steel."_

Anders sighed, settling back against the pillows. The elfroot draught was taking effect, and the throbbing pain of his headache was easing off. "Well, all in all I guess it could have been worse," he said. At least no one had gotten hurt – at least, not counting the Hanged Man's walls – although they would probably have to come up with some way to apologize to Meredith for assaulting her statue.

Deep inside, a slumbering glow like a banked bed of coals stirred slightly.  _She started it,_  Justice thought grumpily.

* * *

 

~end.

 


End file.
